Quick and easy dinner: Carbonara

So, we're going on a long vacation (I'll be posting during the trip, but mostly pretty pictures of the American East Coast) in a couple of days. I'm trying to clean out the fridge by either using everything in a meal or by freezing things which will freeze.

We had a bunch of bacon to use and my daughter's favorite meal uses bacon, so tonight's dinner was Carbonara. It's quick, easy, and very filling. It's not the healthiest meal, though.

You'll need bacon, eggs, milk, parmesan, pasta and an appetite.

First, cut meaty bacon into small strips - I cut off all the fat I can. Start water boiling for pasta at the same time. You'll need it ready to go once the bacon and eggs and cheese are mixed together.

Then take several eggs (I had 5 left, so I used them all). Beat them, then add milk. You're basically making scrambled eggs, so use whatever are your preferred proportions for that.

Mix in some grated parmesan - I like the good stuff, and I use a wide blade micro-plane grater.

(I think the cheese looks pretty, so I took another picture.)

Add the bacon to the eggs/milk/cheese.

Drain the pasta, then put it into the pan you cooked the bacon in.

Mix in the eggs and bacon mixture.

Cook everything together, over low heat, until the eggs turn creamy and coat the pasta.

Serve it up and enjoy! Mmmm, delicious.

I still have an awful lot to get done - I haven't finished the lace shawl I'm making as a gift for the friends we're staying with. I want to finish it by tomorrow, so I'll be staying up late tonight knitting. Hmmm, brainless TV, here I come.

SongBird

Etsy Success!!!

After endless dithering and worrying (What if no one likes them? What if I put them in the wrong place? What if I can't write?), I've put my first set of embroidery patterns up on Etsy!

Go check it out: SongBirdGifts

I'm sorry to post something so self-serving, but this has been making me anxious for so long and it turned out to be really easy! Now to hurry up and make more.

I already have several other patterns I can finish - I have mermaids, pretty swirls, some round cats...

*glee*

And, so this isn't a text only post:

This is my old bike. I can't find a lot of information about these bikes online, but I know that I want to restore this. He has *headlights*!!

This is one of the local cacti - when I was growing up, my mom grew succulents. At the time, I thought they were silly and ugly, but now I want to have tons of them myself. I love the funny shapes and hidden curls they have.

SongBird

Surprise: Wedding!

No, not mine. (I'm not married, but that's not the point.)

(I want to buy more of this fabric! Isn't it pretty?)

Two friends of mine, people I helped get together in the first place, are getting hitched on Sunday. They've been very lax about telling people - the woman who's the Best Man... just found out on Tuesday.

Anyway, I'm making them a quilt - in a hurry! I've decided to use one of the packets of pre-cut 10" squares I bought whilst on vacation in New Hampshire with some fabric I have in stash to make a half-square triangle quilt. I'm adding sashing, even though I don't want to, so it's a good, lap sized quilt without using the same fabrics twice in the triangles.

I liked these blues when I saw them in the store - it was a pack of 20 10" squares for $10!

I stacked the squares up, then marked down the center from corner to corner. What you're supposed to do next is sew 1/4" inch away from the marked line on both sides of it. What I inevitably do, every single time I do this is:

*facepalm* So, I unpicked that and found that whilst I'd been concentrating, someone had arrived to help.

I guess she was worried that my blocks might get cold. Or something.

I'm easy to entertain - I get a kick (every time) out of chain piecing into a circle.

Anyway, the blocks are all sewn and cut (and I really need to work on making my 1/4" seams a full quarter inch. I'm bad about that.) I did end up going to the local fabric store (on my bike!) and getting a dark leavy blue for the sashing and two prints that will amuse my friends (coffee beans and kitty foot prints) for the back.

I was very pleased that I managed to cycle home with the batting. It's six yards of 5oz polybatting.

Today I want to finish the top and see if I can get the quilting started. It's not even 9am. Surely I can get lots done today, right?

SongBird

Working steadily

I've been doing lots of work, but not enough housework. (I can say that the dishwasher's missing a piece, which is true, but it's not a valid excuse as I know perfectly well how to wash dishes by hand.) There's soo much laundry to fold!

I have been working, slowly, on making nicer things for us to use in the house - napkins and placemats and coasters. I've only made the two but I finally have cork and cardboard to back them.

However, I finally have my first embroidery pattern set ready to go into my shop!! I'm so excited!

It's four cute little voodoo baby dolls, each sized perfectly to fit into a 4" hoop or to use as the center patch in a pillow. I really enjoyed every part of the process.

I have a couple of other sets of embroidery patterns in the works - the hardest part of this for me is writing them up afterwards.

***

Something I'm trying to do is bring ATC cards with me so that whenever I have a free minute, I can doodle. This sometimes ends up like this:

I'm not sure if it worked. What do you think?

SongBird

We had a nice, quiet weekend. Saturday Geordie had to go in to work, so I dragged my daughter out with me. We stopped off at a thrift store, then an art supply store (as opposed to a craft store - there's an interesting difference in what each one carries), and finally, a book store.

I got several nice tee shirts, two sweaters (a stripy angora one I'm wearing now and a pale blue cashmere one. Neither was over two bucks!) and a long black trench coat that fits me. This is amazing because I'm shorter than five feet tall. Really.

I also got some embroidery done, and I finished drawing two more pieces of art for embroidery patterns. Next up on the learning curve is figuring out how to make the patterns into PDF documents, so I can put them up in etsy.

On Sunday we spent several hours at a friends' house, where I ... sewed a giant curtain for her. The original plan had been for me to help her sew the curtains, but when I realized just how much she didn't know, I took over. It did make me realize how experienced I am in this area.

I ended up not having time (or a sewing needle) to sew the pleats into place, but at least there's something up in the window for now.

The tree up at the top is near the yarn store I teach in twice a week. A couple of years ago, when I still just had a terrible crush on Geordie, rather than getting to actually be his partner, I spent a happy couple of hours parked under that tree, chatting to him on the phone before going in to teach. I still get a little rush of joy when I see that it's flowering.

Aren't they pretty?

He's suggested putting rooting compound on the branch I cut off, so I can have one of the trees for my very own. I like that idea a lot!

What do you think?

SongBird

Scrapbooking?

So, we went on a week long trip to New Hampshire at the beginning of April. I took lots of pictures, as I tend to do. I like the idea of scrapbooking, I always enjoy seeing other people's pages and art, I have lots of supplies for it (and for making cards and books and ...) but, somehow, I never get around to doing it myself.

I decided that I'm going to do it for this past trip, so I pulled out some 6x6 cardstock and printed out a bunch of pictures. Each page takes a while to do, and they're very much not finished (and I want to make more pages with other pictures from the trip), but mostly, I'm feeling frustrated. The pages don't look as good to me as the ones I see from other people. I don't know if it's because they're mine, so I'm more judgemental, or if it's just that they're not finished yet (and it shows)...

Also, I'm really not sure that this is my 'craft'. Merrie won't look at the book, when it's done, and Geordie hates to see pictures of himself, so he won't look either. That sort of means that there's no one to show the book to - other than here, online.

What do you think? Are they okay? What do they need? (Besides journalling - I haven't written the journalling yet.)

SongBird

The View from My Bike

 Really, this is one of the strongest reasons for me to keep cycling.  I love being out there, with the wind on my face and this to look at.

SongBird

I've been doing a lot, and even taking pictures, but not posting about them.

Wearing daisies always makes everything better.

Many of the things I've been up to are small, and somehow it seems pointless to post just to say that yes, I've put off the laundry again, and I've finished one small bit of embroidery, and the teenager is being, well, a teenager (and therefor annoying), and in other (non) news, I've been cycling several times a week and not lost any weight.

Which sucks.

My daughter, who's 17 and variously stroppy in random ways and at random times, has mastered the art of the Passive Aggressive Note:

I think I should be proud of her. What do you think?

I've been practicing with my spinning wheel -

I also finished a handmade book with felted cover for a friend in Australia! I enjoyed the sewing, and now I want to make one for myself.

I also made her a scalloped garland - I do hope she likes the bright colors. I know I do - I'm certainly making several more for myself.

My backyard has started to produce pretty things! I planted the bulbs for these a couple of months ago. I also have an amaryllis, and some daffodils.

One of my pairs of jeans got a hole in the knee, so I made some cute half-inch hexes and put them on. I thought they needed something to balance them out, so I put two on the other side, up near the pocket.

So, since I'm hungry and I haven't eaten much today, I'm going to go see if I can find my kitchen. I'm sure it's where the dishes are - maybe I'll even get some of them washed. The question is, will I get them washed and then forget to eat again? I'll leave you to ponder that and gaze at the pretty, springlike daisies I've found everywhere.

SongBird

Cycling

I've promised myself I'm going to be better about this, and I keep not pushing myself about it.

I will cycle every day. Around the island I live on is 6 miles and mostly flat. Most of it is quite pretty, even with the horrible headwind off the bay. I made it today - 6 miles in 35 minutes. Tomorrow I'm going to do it again. Friday also, but Monday, I'm going to see if I can make it one and a half times around. If I can, I'll give myself two days at that level, then see how much further I can go. If I'm going to get stronger and lose weight, I'm certainly not going to do it sitting on my (ample) butt.

Up and at 'em.

I was actively rolling at 11:30 and I made it home at 12:05. Not bad. Plus, I didn't coast. Well, I did coast over the spots which are so bumpy that sitting on the seat and pedalling will make your crotch get up and leave you forever, and I coasted past the sweet little old lady pumping along on her walker. Plus, I had to wait for a second cycle of the light at the one intersection with a light. I'm not great at starting off. *facepalm*

Then, once home, I swept up the back yard. I haven't put all the sweepings into the greenwaste bin. I might decide to be lazy and ask Geordie to do it. *is lazy*

I should go take a shower now!

SongBird

Stash acquisition!

I went shopping yesterday at Keepsake Quilting, and its sister shop, Patternworks. I got, well, lots of things. I also went to The Elegant Ewe, for more locally sourced yarns.

Locally grown and spun wool and alpaca.  The blue yarn is wool from New Hampshire sheep and the brown is alpaca from the next town over from Concord, NH. 

Cute little pack of fat eights.  I think I'll make coasters and scrappy napkins?

I liked this yardage calculator.  The yarn is made of milk protein fiber and soy!  Very cool, don't you think?

I liked these fat quarters, but they don't really go together.  They'll go with something I have at home, I'm sure of it.

Pre-cut hexies!!  There are 100 - what can I make with them?  I have no idea how big the hexes will be...

I've wanted die-cuts from this company for years.  I'm really pleased with my butterflies.

Strangely, fish in New Hampshire seem to taste strongly of strawberry candy.  *grin*

These are 10" squares.  I think there might be enough, if I add some strips of solids, to make a quilt  out of each pack!  Yay for more quilts!

Tomorrow, we're going to see what's up north. I've been to a few places in northern New Hampshire, but it was snowing and dark, so I didn't actually see much. I've heard it's really pretty and I'd love to see it.

I've taken pictures of the Boston Aquarium and other local pretty places - I'll try to post those as well.

I hope everyone's having a good week.

SongBird